My first year at Bristol Grammar School (1967-8), along with memories of sports

Once upon a time, until about 1965, there used to be something called the 'eleven plus': a compulsory exam that all children would sit prior to finishing primary school (aged 11). Those that passed this exam would go to 'good' schools, whereas those that didn't would go to 'other' schools. Around 1965, this exam was abolished, or at least the compulsory part of it was. It became retitled to something like 'the grammar school entrance exam'; those who chose to sit the exam and passed went to what were then the direct grant grammar schools, good schools. Those who failed the exam or chose not to bother automatically went to comprehensive schools. No doubt these terms are explained at Wikipedia but I'm not going to bother and look them up.

As I have probably written elsewhere, I sat this exam and did so well that I won a free scholarship to Bristol Grammar School (BGS) - this meant that I (or my parents) didn't have to pay any fees to the school. Other possibilities were a partial scholarship, presumably paying reduced fees, and a place - full fee paying. I've been trying to remember what the exams were about: there was definitely one on arithmetic. There might have been one on general knowledge and one on "English", presumably comprehension, although we might have had to write a story. I do remember the room in which the exam was held - I don't think that I set foot in this room once in all the six years that I was at BGS. There were two other direct grant schools for boys in Bristol (there were four for girls), but these seemed to have Christian connections whereas BGS was agnostic, so I wasn't interested in going to them.

During the summer holidays of 1967, I was informed as to which house I was to join. This is a tradition that comes from boarding schools, where the boarders physically lived in their house, along with their house-master. All the direct grant schools were day schools, but the tradition lived on. It was mainly for competitive purposes, i.e. games. We had to wear a tie every day: it could be either the school tie or the house tie - my house was called Trott's (after Mr Trott) and our colour was green. So I had a green tie and green topped socks.

I can remember the names of most of my teachers from the first year (confusingly called the 'thirds'): Mr Firth taught science, Mr Leaver Latin, Mr Williams maths (and choir), Mr Dehn French and Mr Patton English and physical education. Presumably we also were taught history and geography, but these were subjects that did not appeal to me. I have a strong memory of an early science lesson: Mr Firth asked what a curve in the surface of a molecular substance is called when it touches another material (e.g. water in a test-tube). Three boys (including me) put their hands up; the first boy was called and gave the wrong answer. The second boy also gave the wrong answer. Then it was my turn: "meniscus" I answered; Mr Firth walked towards me and I seriously thought that he was going to hit me (not that this was permissable) for giving an obviously wrong answer. Instead he made a tick mark on my jacket sleeve with chalk: I had given the correct answer (I was good at general knowledge). At the end of the year, I achieved three As in the annual exams: in science, Latin and slightly surprisingly in maths. These was my best marks in all my years at BGS.

I also have a memory of going to my father's office, which was about half a mile from the school, near the Cabot tower. We had homework to write out declensions of Latin verbs, so I sat there, writing amo amas amat amamus amatis amant, like schoolboys throughout the ages. That late afternoon was sufficient to fix the declension in my mind for a few years (and I still remember it, although everything else is hazy). I may remember very little Latin, but what I learnt in those lessons greatly helped me when I started learning Hebrew.

I have no idea on what basis we were divided between the six houses, but the boys in my year and house (with whom I was to spend a great deal of non-academic time) were pretty good at sports. For the first two terms we played rugby and I think that we won the 'championship', played between all six houses. We definitely won the cricket 'championship'; in fact we won it four times out of the six years that I was at the school.

I gave up rugby as soon as I could, 'playing' it only in the winter term from my second year onwards. Being small and rotund afforded me no advantages and the frequent rain didn't help. From the second year I played hockey in the spring term and became quite good at it. I was in the school hockey team for a few years, playing right wing, but unfortunately we didn't win a single game in all those we played against other schools. I missed what would have been our final game (presumably in April 1972) as I had just had inoculations (tetanus?) prior to travelling to Israel in the summer of 1972 (April seems very early, now that I think of it), and my replacement scored the goal that won the game! In my final year at school, I played inside right for the school's second XI, which was much more fun. I actually scored a goal or two and we won most of our matches. We also beat the Old Bristolians' hockey club (featuring Fred Wedlock), a feat that apparently had never occurred before or since.

My house came very close to winning the school hockey championship that year (1973). A friend (in the first XI) and I built the team from those in our house who we knew played hockey, along with a few rugby players who were sufficiently athletic to make a contribution. We won our first game or two; the final was an exceedingly close match (which nearly came to blows at one stage when one of the rugby players on the other side made a somewhat physical tackle, or similar) and in fact ended in a draw, 1-1 (IIRC). The game, though, was decided in favour of our opponents as they had had more 'corners'. I found this very hard to believe as I was the corner-taker for our team and there was a period when I took three or four corners in a row. I think that I was almost in tears at the end.

We had one very good swimmer in our year (he was something of a late developer and stayed an extra year to become head boy) and presumably one or two other reasonably good swimmers. I was asked to swim a length of backstroke for the medley, and I agreed, on the minor condition that I be awarded 'swimming colours' at the end of the year, regardless of how well I swam. I also picked up cricket and hockey 'colours' at the end of the year so I could be seen to be quite good at sports.

We won the cricket championship that year, although my contribution in the final was minimal. For some reason the captain sidelined me all the time (although I suppose that I wasn't so good). I seem to remember holding a catch when fielding slip, but what happened was that the ball came towards me and ran up my sleeve, getting caught in my armpit. I certainly didn't catch it with my hands.

I also represented the school, on and off,  playing cricket at various ages. Sometimes I would be in, sometimes out. I have a memory of being about 14 and going in last: I managed to defend my wicket long enough for my partner to make some runs. The master in charge was so impressed that he had me batting number three (i.e. a specialist batsman) in the next game; I was out first ball and probably out of the team for a couple of games. I became a scorer, sometimes for my age group and sometimes for the higher level teams.

At some stage I also played for the school's second XI when I was young; they were short one person and I must have been available (scorer?). This is where I met three young gentlemen who were two years older than me but very kind to me in the following years, when I was probably an obnoxious twerp. In my last year I very much wanted to play in the second XI but was deemed not good enough; I was offered the opportunity of captaining what was then a non-existent third XI, but I was sufficiently hurt to turn this offer down.

In June 1972,  I was telephoned one day at home and asked if I wanted to play a game of cricket for the Old Bristolians second XI (the OBs were sports teams made of graduates from the school). I would love to. Here I got the chance to bowl a bit (one wicket) and made a catch. I don't remember what number I was batting - might it be three again? - but this time I deserved the position. I got off to a rather sticky start: at one end of the ground, the sun was right behind the bowler's arm so I couldn't see the ball when it left his hand and came towards me. There was an appeal for LBW that was turned down (although I think that the umpire later told me that I should have been out and that he left me in for sporting reasons). After this, the going got a bit easier ... and easier ... and eventually I scored 60 runs, a huge score. By the end I was running out of partners and was having to 'steal the strike' quite often. I was also quite tired and half deliberately got out by hitting a ball in the air to a fielder who caught it. Game over.

Then I had the most momentous summer of my life until then (Israel 1972) and completely forgot about this game, until a few months later when someone said that they had also played for the OB 2nd XI (or similar) and had leafed through the score book, where they were very surprised to see the details of my innings.

My life as multiples of 11

Today is my 66th birthday - that's 6 times 11.

I emigrated when I was barely aged 22 - 2 X 11 - and so I have lived 44 years (4 X 11) in Israel. Of those 44 years, for 11 years I lived on Kibbutz Mishmar David, and for 33 years (3 X 11) I have lived on Kibbutz Tzora.

Prior to my emigration, I lived 11 years in Bristol and 11 years elsewhere.

Of course, this situation occurs every 11 years.

Kate Bush - a little harmonic analysis

First of all, unless I am mistaken, today is Kate's 64th birthday. 64 is a great number: 8², which is 4⁴, which is 2⁸. A very round and palindromic number. Happy birthday!

But I'm not writing numerical analysis and not sending birthday greetings. Instead I want to give a little harmonic analysis of a few of Kate's songs. My interest was picqued by the several analysis videos that I've seen on YouTube about 'Running up that hill', each coming from a different angle. What is clear is that the song is composed entirely of three chords: in roman numeral analysis, i bVI bVII (the song is in C minor, so these chords are Cm, Ab and Bb).

Although this isn't world shattering, this did start me thinking about the chord sequences in Kate's songs - or rather, the lack of conventional sequences. This reminded me of why I was originally attracted to Kate's songs - they are unpredictable and mainly defy analysis. The prime example might be the opening to 'Wuthering Heights', the original (in more ways than one) song that introduced me and thousands of others to KB. The first phrase repeated twice consists of the chords A F E C#. Apart from the fact that these are all major chords, they don't belong to any one key. Whilst E is the dominant of A, there is no key that contains the A, F and C# chords. F is the submediant of A (the flattened sixth, to be accurate) and C# is the mediant of A (the diatonic chord would be C# minor). One could say that this is a series of chromatic mediants - A to F, E to C#, C# to A. As a result of all this, Kate Bush is one of the few artists whose songs I don't automatically analyse in my head.

I started thinking about other KB songs that have the i bVI bVII sequence and two songs came to mind. The first song on the first KB album, 'Moving' starts off with this sequence but afterwards continues in a more diatonic path. The first song on 'The sensual world' (alternatively called 'The sensual world' or 'Flower of the mountain' depending on which version is being played) has a variation on this: I VII VI VII repeated throughout the song, although it might be that the fourth chord (VII) is really v (i.e. the minor dominant chord).

Today I was plunking around on the piano when it suddenly occurred to me that 'Cloudbusting', a song from the same album as 'Running up that hill' has exactly the same chord sequence (i VII VI) although I don't know in which key (I have relative pitch, not absolute pitch). But the two songs are so different in every aspect that one would never reach this conclusion easily.

[Addition from several months later] It was pointed out to me that the opening song on the second side of the album, 'And dream of sheep', starts with exactly the same chord sequence as 'Cloudbusting', even in the same key, C# minor.

One year since my father died

It's exactly one Gregorian calendar year since my father ז"ל died (the Hebrew anniversary is in a few weeks), so I thought that I would write something in his memory. Looking at the blogs from a year ago, I see that there was no preparation: boom, he died. That's not how it happened.

My mother ז"ל died in 2002; this was quite a surprise. She had been hospitalised a few days beforehand, but there was talk of discharging her when overnight all the systems in her body collapsed. At least her actual death was peaceful. My father had never been alone since having met my mother in 1952, so we were quite worried about how he would manage. To our surprise, he coped quite well, suddenly discovering a modest talent for cooking (in my childhood, there was a running joke that all he could cook was burnt toast). In 2012, we even celebrated his 90th birthday in a restaurant in Tel Aviv.

About a year later, he suffered from a minor urinary infection, which to a young person would have been negligible, but apparently such infections in the elderly cause a scrambling of the brain. We took him to a gerontologist in Jerusalem where he was asked basic questions like what day of the week is it, what year are we in, and who is the prime minister of Israel. Whilst getting the third question wrong would be understandable, he failed the other questions; his mental condition was much worse than I had suspected.

Even before this, we had been given 'points' from the National Insurance that covered the cost of a few hours a day of help; a woman would come from Bet Shemesh, clean his flat, cook some meals, and talk with him. But after the gerontologist, it became clear that he shouldn't be left alone, and so we received permission from the Ministry of the Interior to employ a foreign worker, or in the colloquial, 'have a Philipina'. We also got more points from the NI, but a full time worker meant that her salary had to be supplemented; fortunately my father's pension easily covered this.

I've noticed that when people are forced to get around by golf cart, they cease walking; a similar phenomenon happened when the Philipina arrived: my father did less and less, retreating into himself. Still, she would bring him to us for lunch every Saturday, we would visit here and there, and he even was photographed with his first great-grandchild. 

Sometime in 2019, I noticed that he basically was in a world of his own. People used to ask me how he was, and using my terms of reference, I would say that he is like a computer that is plugged in but lacks a screen and keyboard: his body was working but he couldn't communicate with us, nor us with him. I requested our family doctor to look at him: her verdict that physically he was ok and not suffering from anything that could be treated. The nurses would check on him once a month to see that there was no deterioration.

The first year of Covid-19 was problematic, as his regular Philipina had gone home for a holiday in February 2020 and was due back in mid-March, which was the day the airport closed (so she didn't return then). We were fortunate to find a replacement, someone who might be termed a free agent who was also somewhat illegal, in that she wasn't funded by the NI. This carer was actually much better than the regular one; on the one hand, we wanted her to continue, but on the other hand, she was costing us a great deal of money, and one day the regular carer would manage to return. This state of affairs lasted for about five months. One major suggestion of the free agent was to place my father in a mechanical bed that could be raised and lowered as need be; we got the bed from Yad Sara, an organisation that provides and/or loans medical equipment for the home.

Vaccinations for Covid-19 became available at the end of 2020. At first, the Philipina didn't want to be vaccinated: we had to talk to her several times about this. We very much wanted my father to be vaccinated, more as a precaution, as the chances of him catching the virus were minimal - except via the Philipina. Although her age (the same as my daughter) would have made her ineligible for vaccination, people in her position were vaccinated along with the people that they looked after. So somehow I got my father into a wheelchair and took him to Bet Shemesh; here we faced a problem: how to explain to him that he was about to be vaccinated for a virus that had caused a great deal of disruption in the previous year? Of course, there was no way, so he reacted physically (and probably cried out) when the needle went in. Fortunately, the vaccinations were over extremely quickly. There were no side effects, and three weeks later we repeated the procedure.

It wasn't until one Friday night in June when the Philipina phoned me as we were having dinner: she was very worried about my father. After a few minutes of indecision, I decided to go and see how he was, which was exceedingly not good. He was undergoing contortions and every few minutes would stop breathing (completely unlike sleep apnea). I called the on-call medic (there is always someone on the kibbutz who can handle emergencies, primarily heart failure) but he quickly saw that there was nothing that he could do.

So we called an ambulance that arrived several minutes later; the ambulance men checked him out and said that there was nothing that they could do either, so we had a midnight ride to Hadassa hospital (part of the route is on a cliff edge, so driving this fast at night is somewhat frightening). In the emergency room, he didn't appear to receive much treatment. The doctor noticed that he had a fever, so he was given antibiotics and probably paracetamol via infusion; after an hour or so, he became more relaxed. I think that I took him for a CT to see whether there was any internal cranial bleeding (there was none). At about 3 am, we were taken somewhere else in the hospital (I got a bit lost) and he was placed in a room by himself. A resident came in to check him then told us to rest. The Philipina sat in the comfy chair and I laid down on a mini-sofa to sleep. I awoke a few hours later and went in search of some medical personnel; a nurse checked my father out, just to make sure that he was still with us. He probably changed the infusion as well.

Fortunately I had money in my wallet (a rare occurrence) so I was able to find a taxi that would take home. I slept for a few hours then with my wife went back to the hospital; here I swapped placed with the Philipina who my wife drove home so that she could rest for a few hours, shower, change clothes and eat. As it was Saturday, all the shops and cafes in the hospital were closed. 

For the next twelve days, I would get up in the morning, do a little work, eat breakfast, then pick up the Philipina and drive to the hospital - she's still working and is required to accompany her charge when in hospital. Sometime between 3 and 4 pm we would return home. She would help the nursing staff (she actually is a nurse herself, although I was not particularly impressed by her skills) and I would interface with the medical staff. I had noticed that my father wasn't capable of closing his mouth, and aligned with the loss of ability to move his left arm, it appeared that he had suffered a minor stroke.

I was told that a speech therapist would come and evaluate his capability; as there were only two speech therapists for the entire hospital, it wouldn't be until the following Sunday (i.e. after eight days of hospitalisation) that he was seen. One day a nutritionist came; one of her questions was how tall my father was. I told her that he was bit shorter than me, but that he had shrunk so I wasn't sure how tall he was now. She saw that the Philipina was feeding him Ensure (which we had bought) and said that the hospital would provide this - but in all the time that we were there, I never saw the hospital provide a can of Ensure. 

The day after the visit of the speech therapist, I accompanied my father to the bowels of the hospital where he was to have a feeding tube ('zonda') inserted. This turned out to be a much harder procedure than anticipated, primarily because his head had shrunk, and the angle from the mouth into the oesophagus was sharper than normal. I was told to provide an infusion stand and a pump that feeds the zonda: one gets such a machine from Yad Sara, so that day after finishing our hospital stint, I drove to the main YS warehouse in Jerusalem in order to get the equipment. Unlink the mechanical bed and other items, one has to pay 4 NIS a day for the zonda pump. 

The next day, I took the equipment up to the ward where I requested someone to show us how to use it. In the mean time, a doctor had informed me that whilst checking the placement of the zonda, they had seen (presumably by x-ray) that there was liquid in my father's lungs. Presumably he had aspirated something, but because he was continually lying down and his weakness, he was unable to clear this liquid. 

Once I heard this, I knew that the end was close. This was on Tuesday, so I was only mildly surprised to receive a phone call from the hospital at about 1 am on the Friday to say that my father was on the way out, and that I should come to the hospital to say goodbye. I replied that I had been in the hospital all day and had already said my farewells, and that artificially maintaining his life so that I could come and see him die was not something that I wanted. My wife concurred.

I tried to go back to sleep after this but it was impossible, which is why my first blog on the topic was posted at 3:40 am. A few hours later, we went to the hospital and up to the ward, where I was given his belongings - the clothes that he had been wearing when he was hospitalised. I'm not sure whether the zonda pump was in his room or whether I had taken this home a day or so previously. A doctor and a nurse tried to explain and comfort me, but I told them that it was fine, that his death was not a surprise and that he was no longer suffering (nor I). We then went home and sat with the Philipina; she reacted more visibly than I did, having looked upon my father as the grandfather that she never knew. The carers are well-known for the empathic bond that they make with their charges, and often at funerals, these people break down crying, whereas everyone else tries to hold their emotions.

The blogs that I wrote in the immediate aftermath of my father's death seem emotionless to me now. It's not that I wasn't feeling anything; it's more that this was an event that I had been anticipating for a few years, and its eventual happening was a release that was more welcome than saddening. I had lost my father several years before he died, and whilst now I wish that I had spent a little more time with him, I know that I did spend the time when it meant something.

The middle portion of David Lodge's "Deaf sentence" is very similar to my experience.

Kate Bush (once again)

Seemingly like everyone else on the planet, I've been undergoing a renewed interest in Kate Bush. This started a few months ago whilst listening to 'Before the dawn', the multiple-cd set of recordings from her performances in 2015 that sold out within 15 minutes. This can roughly be divided into three parts: unconnected songs, the 'ninth wave' suite from 'The hounds of love', and the 'Sky of honey' suite from 'Aerial'. As it happens, originally I wasn't too enamoured with the ninth wave and sky of honey suites when I first heard them.

Somehow, these live versions seemed much more palatable than the original versions; after listening to the live versions, I decided to go back to the original studio versions, which now do find favour in these quarters.

During the month of June 2022, Kate's star has risen once again, with one of her songs being featured in a Netflix series. Now all sorts of Youtube videos are rising to the top; today I came across a most fascinating document - a collection of appearances on BBC TV, recorded in the day. The first few appearances feature performances that are not the well-known recorded versions, although these are not live! One can hear Kate harmonising with herself here and there, tending to imply that no one is playing live. I saw on one song ('This woman's work') a miscue in the miming, not that this is too important. 'Wuthering Heights' - where it all started - is a completely new version: new arrangement (although very close to the original) and possibly live vocal. I notice that Kate's hand movements during the chorus must have been fixed at an early stage as these are consistent over all the performances that I have seen. I have never seen any of these performances before, primarily because I emigrated in 1978 when Kate's career was taking off, and no one in Israel had heard of her then (we also didn't really have television station(s) either, then).

Kate is almost exactly two years younger than me (her birthday is four days before mine) so I know automatically how old she is in every video. It's interesting to see how she has aged: initially, she looks much older than she really was (I remember looking at the photo on her first album and thinking 'oh, this is what she looks like, maybe in her mid-20s' - she was 19!), but later on she takes on a more mature appearance. Unfortunately the most recent pictures of her show a great deal of middle age spread, a feature normally reserved for males who drink.

I am including Kate's version of 'My lagan love' in my folk songs talk - her version has the same immaculate song sung unaccompanied, but with new lyrics by her brother. I will wear my Sandy Denny t-shirt.

The malleability of folk songs (2)

I gave my talk a few days ago, in Hebrew, to an audience of 12-15 people - rather disappointing. The talk was supposed to last about 75 minutes; I had music for 50 minutes, but I talked much more than I had planned, as I never got to the final song. As far as I am concerned, the talk went well, although it was difficult to tell; indirectly I received a few positive reactions.

Yesterday at the swimming pool I was approached by a lady who runs a similar group for OAPs, this time in English. Would I care to repeat my talk? She can't promise me a bigger audience, but I suppose this doesn't matter. She asked what the title of the talk was, and when I mentioned 'malleability', she became concerned: it might be that some of the audience don't know this word and might be threatened by it. As I probably mentioned in the earlier blog, I couldn't find a word in Hebrew for 'malleability' and had to suffice with 'flexibility'; it's not quite the same. 

'Malleability' is a word used in connection with defining what a metal is; given a lump of tin, one can change its form greatly, like plasticine. People have taken folk songs and changed their shape and form. This is what I mean; 'flexibility' seems like a compromise.

The talk is planned for next Sunday.

Aches and pains: my first swim of the year

It's mid-June, and as always, it's time for the first swim of the year, utilising muscles that have weakened somewhat since last September, the end of last year's swimming season.

First, it was the big toe on my left foot that throbbed a bit: the toe hasn't recovered completely from the gout attack that was only a week ago. With regard to that, I saw our GP on Tuesday, and after we discussed the subject of gout, she decided to start me on the chronic use of Allopurinol, a lowish dose at first. At the end of the month I will be having my comprehensive annual blood tests, so we will be able to see whether two weeks of this drug have managed to lower my uric acid level, which has always been high. She also mentioned that there is normally 3-6 months between gout attacks, and that next time (if there is a next time) I should take Naxin as the primary pain reliever as opposed to Advil or similar, as Naxin better suits my medical profile. I only realised later that she didn't give me a prescription for Naxin; imagine that an attack happens on a Friday afternoon - a few days of pain await me. I shall have to remember this for my next appointment, when we review the results of the blood tests.

Back to swimming: the next ache came when pushing off from the ends of the pool; there's a muscle in the middle of my right thigh that suddenly contracted. This bothered me during my entire time in the pool, but especially at the end of every length. Walking home didn't use this muscle but I felt it again whilst walking up the stairs.

And finally, as expected, my left arm began aching after a few lengths; this always happens the first time, but I expect it to go away shortly.

During June, the pool opens at 8:30 am both on Friday and Saturday, meaning that there will be no Friday swims for a few weeks. I hope that the pool will open at 7:30 am on a Friday, which is much more convenient for me. Also fewer people come at that hour (today the pool was 'packed' - about twelve people swimming at the same time with a few waiting for a spot).

Preparations for Bari video

A few years ago, I wrote The first step in [creating a video] is to convert all the MOV files to WMV format so that Movie Maker can handle them; there is a program which does this painlessly albeit slowly. I'm not sure to which program I was referring but I no longer have such a program. Not only that, the video camera creates MOD files, not MOV, although that point isn't really important.

I tried a few programs on the Internet: one can upload files, have them converted, then download them; this is a painful process and not something that I would like to rely upon. All of the programs that I found that can be installed on one's computer and perform the conversion all have their problems, such as converting only half of each file (the idea is to check out the program then buy it in order to convert the entire file).

All of the programs except for one: eventually I found a program called Handbrake that purports to convert MOD files to WMV, except that it creates files with an M4V extension. I discovered that files with this extension can be loaded into Movie Maker so these converted files are fine. The user interface to Handbrake could be improved no end: it's set up for converting single files. There is a method for converting all the files in a directory but it's far from intuitive. Fortunately someone wrote a tutorial so I was able to convert all the video files with a minimum amount of pain. Actually, that's not totally true: several times the converted output files went into the wrong directory.

I've started work on creating a video: so far I've completed the hotel sequence, where we spent the first two nights. Some of what I filmed didn't turn out well - more pictures of my trouser pocket - but there is enough.

Italy 2022: Returning home

We had an easy morning, packing and cleaning up, until our taxi came at 12 pm to take us to the airport so that we would have plenty of time before our 3:45 pm flight.

Except for the fact that the flight was due to leave at 13:45!!!! We found the Ryanair check-in counter; there was a long queue and one person seemed to be holding everybody up. We quickly realised that there was no way that we could wait for our turn and still be on time, especially as now it was about 12:30 pm and the check-in for our flight was to close at 12:45 pm. My wife did her crying act on a few people who allowed us to jump right to the front, and then we were checking in... or not: the representative was saying that we needed some form in order to enter Israel, despite the fact that we are Israelis. Eventually she called a supervisor and allowed us to check in without further problems.

We then raced through the hand luggage check and passport control, then eventually found our boarding gate. We still had plenty of time. Eventually boarding began, although as I always say, there's no hurry as the plane isn't going to take off without us.

And take off we did. The flight seemed to go reasonably fast, and before we knew it, we had touched down at Ben Gurion airport.

Italy 2022: Staying 'at home'

As I wrote early this morning, I had my first ever attack of gout last night; as a result, I barely slept and my toe was very painful. I dragged myself to breakfast, which fortunately is held in a room a few steps away from our room. After breakfast, my wife went to a pharmacy and bought the equivalent of Neurophen. I took a pill and laid down to rest. Then the skies opened and it rained heavily, which was just as well as we weren't going anywhere. After about three hours, the gross pain had disappeared. After another hour I took another pill, and since then the situation has improved, although there is still sometimes pain, especially when walking.

Late in the afternoon I went out to buy some food for tomorrow: we'll miss both lunch and supper, so we'll prepare rolls in advance.

For supper tonight we went to an interesting restaurant, Frulez, which is much closer than appears on the map. Their menu is somewhat different to those of other restaurants and even includes salads! I had the steamed sea bass fillet along with all kinds of vegetables. The inside of the restaurant is also very interesting.

After dinner, we had gelato - melon and banana - to clean the palate. Despite my best efforts, I still have heartburn as a result of the Neurophen.

So that's it: a week in Bari. Today we were supposed to have gone to see the trulli at Alberobello, which funnily enough is considered to be the major attraction of this area. Well, we've seen them on YouTube videos.

Running up that hill (a deal with God)

To many people's surprise (including herself), Kate Bush's song "Running up that hill" has made a remarkable come-back after 37 years, after having been featured in some hit television show. The lyrics are a bit obscure, but basically Kate wants to make a deal with God, and get him (God) to swap places between Kate and her loved one, so that they can better appreciate life from the other's point of view.

You don't want to hurt me

But see how deep the bullet lies

Unaware, I'm tearing you asunder

Oh, there is thunder in our hearts

Is there so much hate for the ones we love?

Tell me, we both matter, don't we?

We could all do with a bit of swapping places with our loved ones. As I have commented more than once, my wife has problems with her legs; she has undergone a knee replacement on one leg and is about to undergo a bone fusion operation on her other leg. As a result, she walks very slowly whereas I like to walk fast; going on holiday and walking around places can be very difficult.

Last night (and also the night before), the big toe on my left foot hurt somewhat. The first night it wasn't too bad, but last night it was so painful - and still is - that I was barely able to sleep at all; every touch of a sheet on the toe made the constant pain even worse. At the moment I can barely hobble around our hotel room - so we have swapped our places,

I think that this is my first attack of gout; there are several things that agree between what I feel (and know about my blood levels) and what is written in the linked wiki. My father suffered from gout for years and took a prophylactic to prevent it; the article says to try ibuprofen. So I will have to wait for a pharmacy to open in order to buy such pills; I normally never take NSAIDs. 

I wonder whether we are going to do what we intended to do today, as I can barely move and I barely slept. Kate's song is more than apt.

Italy 2022: Ostuni

Today started off the same as Tuesday: get up, have breakfast, get sorted, go to train station, catch 10:02 train to Lecce. But this time we didn't ride to the end of the line; instead we got off at Ostuni, which is midway between Bari and Lecce. Ostuni is often called 'the white city', as many of the walls in the old city are painted with lime (coincidentally I was reading about lime the other day at the Molecule of the Month page). Once off the train, a waiting taxi took us up to the centre of the old city, and before we had time to catch our breath, a brash young man offered to take us on a tour of Ostuni with a "tuk-tuk". 

There is a company in Ostuni that employs several guides for tuk-tuk tours, so it wasn't as if he was exploiting us (at least, not too much). This actually is a good way of seeing the town, as well as fun! My wife's legs wouldn't have allowed us to see as much as we did had we been walking.

Once the breathtaking tour had finished, we decided to have a cup of tea in a nearby cafe. As we did, storm clouds came into view: it started raining again, but this time the rain developed into a complete downpour for about half an hour that left us and all the other patrons of the cafe stranded until the rain eased. Strangely enough, as soon as the rain started, the umbrella sellers appeared; this time we succumbed and bought a big umbrella for 10€ - it's a seller's market. We used the time that we were stranded in order to eat a pizza - big enough for both of us and costing only 7€ (i.e. 3.5€ each), when a cup of tea costs 3€ and there's a cover charge of 3€.

Eventually the rain eased off and we could leave our shelter, aiming for a side street holding various shops. We bought a few items in a shop selling agricultural produce - mainly olive oil and various wines - as well as some ceramics in another shop. On and off the rain was still falling and my throat began itching a little.

When we had finished shopping, we returned to the main square (Liberty Square) where we bumped into our guide from before. We asked him to phone the taxi driver who drove us in the morning (he helpfully gave us his card after the ride in order that he might take us back) as there were no other taxi drivers there. I think that most of the visitors in the old city arrived there by bus from the small train station, or they came in their own cars. The driver appeared after a few minutes and took us back to the station. Fortunately we had to wait only a few minutes for the train that would take us back to Bari.

Once in Bari, we bought some ceramic unicorns for our grand-daughters, that I had seen the day before when wandering around. Then we went home for some sorely needed tea. Then it was up and out again: I wanted to buy - or at least look for - 'the best chocolate in the world'. The mini-market in which I had bought food barely had chocolate at all, so I was looking for other places. Google maps showed me a supermarket not far away and a shop called Caputo Dolciumi that also was not far away. The supermarket didn't seem to have chocolate (and there was a big queue there), but the other shop - that turned out to be at the opposite end of our block, i.e. two minute's walk away - sold only chocolate. My eyes fell on some promising chocolate; at first I picked up several bars of similar chocolate, but then I considered that it might be more prudent to buy one bar of each candidate chocolate and taste it at home. Just as well as none of the chocolates were what I was looking for. I went back there and showed them a photo of the chocolate that I was looking for; they didn't have it but they did have some other mint chocolate that I have yet to taste.

When I was wandering around looking for the supermarket, one of the lenses of my reading glasses fell out. Fortunately I found it and put it in my pocket. When I came back to the flat, my wife put it in place but we didn't have a screwdriver with which to tighten the screw that holds the lens in place. So I had to go out again, looking for an optimist optician. I was sure that I had seen one but I couldn't remember exactly where - it turned out to be just after the supermarket. There they kindly fixed my glasses - without which I wouldn't have been able to write all this (or rather, see what I had written).

Italy 2022: Corso Cavour (2)

Today was a wash-out in more ways than one.

The morning was spent by my wife shopping. I walked around a bit.

Lunch was in an outdoor cafe with a strange menu. I had what might be termed a fusion dish consisting of rice, salmon, cucumbers, carrots, adamame and seaweed. The seaweed tasted really strange and was inedible as far as I am concerned, but the rest was tasty. Too much though: I couldn't eat it all.

In the early evening we had supper on our terrace, then walked down into the old city to see it lit up. It started raining when we were about half-way down Corso Cavour, and by the time we got to the old city, it was raining quite heavily. The only activity that I could see were restaurants, so we gave up on that.

I had spotted a gelateria on one side of the street selling 'after eight' (i.e. mint chocolate) ice cream, so I made a bee-line for there and at least saved something of the day. By the time we had finished eating, the rain had stopped. The colours of some of the flavours were somewhat day-glo, especially cielo (sky) which was a virulent blue. I have no idea what that tastes like and I'm not sure that I want to know.

A long walk back to the flat, and that's that.

Italy 2022: Lecce

Today's activity had us leaving Bari by train and travelling to the southern town of Lecce, that has often been described as the 'Florence of the south'. I think that this term is misleading: it's more like the 'Siena of the south', as the buildings remind me (at least) of those in Siena. After arriving in Lecce following a boring train ride of 100 minutes, we took a taxi to the old city. The first thing that we saw was the staggering Roman amphitheatre, almost completely intact.

After walking around this, we began an investigation into the alleys of the old city; we didn't have a map so we simply followed intuition (and other tourists, to see where they went). To some extent, our path was defined by the amount of shadow, as it was very hot. 

After wandering around the lanes and admiring the architecture, we had a late lunch at the Volo restaurant; when we arrived, there were people sitting outside but we elected to sit inside (and were the only people to do so). Apart from the quality of the food, the decor is very interesting, and it can be seen that a great deal of effort has been placed into making this restaurant a fine place to eat. The restaurant could seat maybe 100 people (there's a second floor) although I don't know when so many people would come all at the same time. As it was hot outside, I didn't have much of an appetite and so chose to have a typical Salento-region soup; there were various vegetables mixed in this but the only one that I identified was probably spinach (two nights in a row!). As can be seen, I drank water, whereas my wife splurged on a glass of red wine (primitivo - I don't think this means 'primitive'!) and a fillet of sea bass. 

After leaving the restaurant, we began to make our way back to the amphitheatre where the taxis are supposed to be, but this time via a different route than the one that we took in the morning. It helps having an inertial navigation device in my head.

Walking down one lane as chosen by the hand of serendipity, I saw the 'statue' that is pictured on the left. The sign behind it says Claudio Riso which made me stop and think for a minute. Riso means rice, but that's not the reason; then it clicked: for a few days before our departure, I had been watching videos* on YouTube about Bari and Puglia, and one of these (which of course I can't find now) had a segment inside the workshop of a craftsman who makes statuettes out of papier mâché (I vaguely remember doing something similar in primary school, although of course on a much lower level). Once having stumbled upon this treasure, we had to go down into the workshop, or rather into the display section of the workshop (the 'work' part is off-limits), enthusing and admiring the various statuettes. No prices were displayed, which is a bit off-putting. After a few minutes, Claudio (presumably) came out to talk to us (the video showed three old men, and Claudio is younger than I am). 

After gushing about the quality of his work, we asked about prices. The cheapest was about 60€ and the most expensive around 250€ - these were of Christian figures and so not interesting to us. Some of the statuettes had 'props', like a guitar or accordion; these extras made those statuettes very expensive. As my wife had arbitrarily set a price ceiling of 100€ - and this was before we knew how much the figurines cost - we didn't have too much choice in what to buy (there was no doubt that we would buy something). In the end we picked a figurine of an Italian dancer (shown below) dancing the pizzica, not the tarantella as I had assumed (this dance was shown in one of the YouTube videos, probably the same one mentioned above, and was also the rhythm chosen by the 'street artist' outside the fort two days ago). This was packed very securely and I hope that the lo-cost air flight will not damage it.

Then back to the amphitheatre, a taxi to the train station then 'home' after another boring train ride.

* I finally found the video that I watched before we went to Italy. The segment with Claudio Riso starts at 4:57 mins within the video and lasts for 3 minutes.

Italy 2022: Corso Cavour

After an even more sumptuous breakfast than the day before, eaten in the garden extension, we packed our bags and set out for our flat on Corso Cavour.  The taxi driver drove towards the centre of Bari and then suddenly (at least) for us stopped in a busy road. We had arrived. I was under the impression that the flat was to the north of the old city so that impression was immediately shattered.

We arrived at about 10:30 am and check in isn't supposed to be for another few hours. We had no way of contacting the flat's manager - or maybe we did: we sat in a cafe next door to the building and used their wi-fi to start sending messages. Eventually we received the codes to the flat and entered.

Shattered illusion #2: I thought that we had a self-catering flat with kitchen, similar to where we stayed in Torino or Venice. No: this is more like a bed and breakfast establishment. What irks is that the price of the flat is almost the same as the hotel, if not slightly more expensive. On the other hand, the hotel is situated in the middle of nowhere and this flat is in a good location.

Once in the flat and connected to the Internet, I looked on the map for where we were. Nowhere near where I thought we'd be. I went out looking for a supermarket - I knew that there was supposed to be one close to the flat, although I didn't know exactly where. A short reconnaissance mission revealed its location, maybe two minutes away. There I bought milk, rolls, tuna, cheese and salmon, the ingredients for easy meals.

After a rest, we got up and went for a walk along Corso Cavour, which appears to be a major through-fare.  I thought that the train station was towards the end of the road (as far as I am concerned), which just goes to show how disorientated I was. When I got to the building that I thought was the station, it turned out to be the Teatro Margherita - which was where the taxi driver dropped us off yesterday! In other words, we're about 500 metres south of the old city, should we decide to visit there again. Behind the theatre is an anchorage and the beginning of the sea promenade; we'll leave that for another evening.

Walking back to the flat, we passed several shoe shops, some of which were selling the type of shoe that I like. One of them had an even better model at a lower price: after I tried these on, I bought two pairs: one blue and one grey. They are much more comfortable than the toe-pinching shoes that I've been wearing for the past month; they are also the correct size (42).

Once we arrived at the flat, I checked the map of the area that I had been looking at previously and discovered that everything seemed to be upside-down, and that left is really right. I was looking for somewhere to eat, and once I figured out where to go, we set off. The first restaurant that seemed promising turned out to be not so promising, so we returned to an eatery that is somewhere between a cafe and a restaurant. It's also without service: one buys a slice of whatever, has it heated up and then one sits at a long table on an uncomfortable chair and eats. My wife had a potato and cheese pasty whereas I had a spinach one; total cost 4€. I think that I saw someone eating this kind of pasty on one of the YouTube Bari videos.

Quite tasty.

After returning home, I set out once more to find the train station which is supposed to be quite close. Using the 'Alice through the looking glass' approach, I quickly found the station; according to my phone, it's 360 metres from the flat, and it took me four and a half minutes to walk there. Of course, I walk quickly, but the major point is that it is very close. There is an interesting fountain in front of the station that I filmed.

Italy 2022: Bari rickshaw tour

The main activity for today was a rickshaw tour of the old city that should be a fun activity by itself, as well as getting a feeling for where everything is in the area.  So, after a good breakfast, we rode in a taxi that was waiting outside of the hotel (not especially for us!), taking us to the edge of the old city. Unfortunately, the map that was printed on the ticket receipt was not very good and didn't show where the rickshaw company was situated. We were dropped off where I've marked an X next to Piazza IV Novembre and walked through Piazza del Ferrarese; we didn't know it at the time, but already we had missed the turning that leads to Strada Valissa (marked in yellow). Instead we walked and walked through the old city in search of a road that we had no chance of finding. Eventually we returned to our starting point, where we found someone who could explain how to get to the tour company (the map section that appears above comes from a picture of a map that I photographed in a shop window; we didn't have it with us).

We arrived at 10:10 am (we were supposed to be there at 9:50) but couldn't approach the counter as there was a group of people hiring bicycles who took up the receptionist's attention for half an hour. When eventually they left, I explained that we had a reservation for 10 am but couldn't find the shop in time. No problem: we were transferred to the 11:30 am tour. I then spent some time looking for a shop where I could buy water and a new hat (my old straw hat had been ruined in the flight to Bari); I thought that I had filmed some of the sights, but later on it turned out that I had filmed my pocket - the old problem of thinking that the camera is on when it's off, and off when it's on.

Eventually our tour began, which was great fun. Riding in the rickshaw was a very good idea as we had shade from the sun and could see the sights with minimum effort. We had thought that the rickshaw driver would be the guide, but no: there was another rickshaw and maybe ten cyclists (including an Israeli couple whom we met whilst queuing yesterday for the flight) accompanying us. The guide pedalled the other rickshaw; we stopped at pre-determined points where the guide would get off her rickshaw and explain about where we stopped.

We had a good tour around the old city, visiting the Castello Svevo (where a 'pavement artist' hijacked the group for making some music - I think that this was a case of the 'artist' seeing the group then asking to perform for us, rather than something planned in advance) which is opposite the famous orecchietta alley (most of the YouTube videos about Bari that we watched in preparation for this trip included a visit to this alley). From there we went through various alleys, including those that we had erroneously walked through in the morning. Then the alleys were wide and empty, and all the doors along them were closed; now the alleys were full of half-full restaurants and there was barely room for our rickshaw to pass without causing problems. Surprisingly for us, the tour finished at the Basilica of St Nicholaus, that was actually the furthest point that I reached in my early morning searches. 

While we were waiting in the tour company's shop for the tour to begin, I noticed a poster for an antiques sale that would take place today at Via Napoli 260. I didn't know where that was, but on the way to the Castello we actually went past this site. This is not the sort of thing that I enjoy but my wife really loves these. We asked our rickshaw driver about this and he said that he would take us there after the tour finished. 

The antiques sale was a odd mixture of high quality glassware and linen mixed with a load of what might politely be termed rubbish. I left my wife to it and walked off in search of a new hat that I found quite quickly (written on the label is "100% paper, made in China"). I walked back to the market where my wife was engrossed in checking out the goods. I sat down on a bench and read my kindle until I heard her shouting my name - she needed money to pay for some glass ornaments that she wanted. By chance, I had earlier seen in the market another two people who had been with us in the queue for checking in the day before.

It was now about 3 pm and finally we were feeling a little hungry. I had seen that there was a small restaurant situated by the market, Tuccio, so we went in there. Strangely enough, we were served by a waiter who is a Christian Arab from a village in the north of Israel who is studying medicine in Italy; he could talk us through the menu in Hebrew. We ordered a single portion of fried hake and potatoes  between us that was more than filling. After paying, we asked the waiter to order a taxi to take us back to the hotel; while we were waiting, my wife talked with two of the waiters and I talked with the proprietor (also young) about Italy and Israel and economic conditions. Very interesting. After some time the taxi came and took us back to our luxury hotel that would be excellent had it been located closer to the old city.

After showering and resting for an hour, my body was screaming out for tea. We went down into the lobby of the hotel, intending to go outside and look for a cafe when I noticed that there was a bar next to the lobby. Aside from the alcoholic drinks it was also possible to order tea with cakes; as opposed to the 'hot' water available at breakfast, this hot water was boiling, and so we had two very good cups of tea each as well as a pastry (filled with cream and cherries - pasticciotto, a local favourite).

After this, we wandered around the lobby and the area outside, which is exceedingly well set out with plenty of shrubs and trees. One of the staff saw us come out and followed us, asking if we wanted a taxi but we said that we just wanted to enjoy the outside of the hotel.

After a while we came back in and went up to our room. Tomorrow we will have another good, if not better, breakfast then we will pack before decamping to our holiday apartment.

If I had to award marks for the day, I would give it 9/10 where the only bad part was the unnecessary (and frustrating) wandering around looking for the tour company.

Italy 2022: Travelling low-cost

The scenes of a crowded Ben Gurion airport shown on television caused us to leave home at 2:30 pm Saturday in order to be at BG at 3 pm, three and a half hours before take off. But as Ryanair flies from the old terminal 1, there weren't very many people there, and we had to wait maybe twenty minutes for the Ryanair check-in to open. Apart from being forced to buy N-95 masks, there were no queues at passport control or luggage checking either. As a result, we sat in the departures lounge for about two hours (I had stopped looking at the time).

The flight to Bari was without incident, although it wasn't exactly a pleasurable experience. Maybe I've forgotten what it's like to fly, but I'm sure that in previous flights I didn't have someone in the adjacent seat digging his elbow into my stomach, as happened a few times. As can be seen in the accompanying photo, we had to be masked at all times, except when eating. We didn't eat on the plane, partially because I (at least) wasn't hungry, but also because most of the items on the plane's menu had been eaten, presumably on the flight from Bari to Tel Aviv. Next week, the flight leaves at 3:30 local time, arrives at Tel Aviv, the engineers retwist the rubber band that powers the aircraft, passengers get on then the plane flies home to Bari. The food gets eaten on the first leg and little is left for the return flight. The touch-down was rather bumpy but that's what one gets when one flies low cost. I do admit though that almost all of my apprehensions did not happen.

Once we got off the plane and through passport control (with only two open booths, so we had to queue for a while), the rest happened very fast. Our single suitcase was on the carousel just as I arrived, so no waiting there. Our pre-booked driver was waiting for us and took us to our sumptuous hotel, where unfortunately we won't have much of a chance to enjoy its facilities as we are here only for two nights.

Senecio walks up the rear garden stairs

Today I just had to wear my new shirt and grab a picture walking up the rear garden stairs. I'm not taking the shirt with me, otherwise we'd have to suffer a series of pictures entitled 'Senecio walks around the old town of Bari', 'Senecio in Lecce' and similar.

There's some weird English written underneath the signature of Paul Klee that also appears on the front of the shirt: "[Art is combined] but with flowers, not with rocy [sic] causes but with ultimate values, not with sex but withisom [sic] not, yunparis [sic] vii [sic] with human nature but with human being. Art is life (riverstone)".

If there is one thing that I detest, it is grammatical errors in t-shirt English; here it's not even English. Presumably "withisom" is supposed to be "with wisdom", but I have no idea what "vunparis vii" is supposed to mean. Also presumably the comma after 'not' should be before it.

Italy 2022: pre-flight check

A major impediment to taking a holiday has been removed, now that the Covid-19 travel restrictions have been lifted. Aligned with this is the fact that my wife will be having surgery on her foot soon, so now seems to be the time to reacquaint ourselves with Italy. Somehow the name 'Bari' was floated - I think that it came from the travel agent - but once I looked into it, Bari became not only a possibility but a definite location. On the map below it's approximately where the red circle is. 

As one can see, Bari is in the south of Italy, on the Adriatic coast, and far away from most of the well-known Italian cities. Not very many people here seem to have heard of Bari*, which in a sense is a good thing, as we won't be hearing Hebrew for a week. Also very interesting is the fact that Rick Steves' 2019 guidebook for Italy stops at Naples/Sorrento/Capri, ignoring Puglia province (in which Bari is situated) as well as Sicily.

We are flying with Ryanair, which is going to be an experience in itself and the major source of apprehension. They fly to and fro once a week on Saturdays only. Once we had the flight sorted out, we could begin working on where to stay; as we had only a few days prior to flying, most places were booked out. Fortunately I was able to snag a very good looking flat in the old town from Monday till Saturday; we'll stay in a hotel for the first two nights and transfer on Monday morning.

Due to various pressures on Sunday when we were working on this, I actually booked for the wrong week! Although the penny dropped quite quickly, it seemed at one stage that Booking would not return our payment, but fortunately that was all sorted, and this morning I saw that my credit card had indeed been credited with the double payment (i.e. the money has been returned).

We're going to play this holiday loose and easy, primarily because of my wife's waning walking abilities, about which I have written probably on every holiday. Fortunately it seems that our flat is in a very good location so there won't be that much walking. 

I didn't notice this before but it's almost exactly ten years since we were in Dubrovnik (a little later in June 2012) and if Dubrovnik is the pearl of the Adriatic, then Bari, almost opposite to Dubrovnik on the other side of the sea, is at least a ruby of the Adriatic. Basically all we want is sea, an old city and a chance to relax a little. I'm sure we'll get all that and more. 

[Incidentally, my previous blog about Senecio did get sent to me automatically, so the hypothesis that blogs with pictures don't get sent has just been falsified.]

* Later on, we discover that two of the families living in the next-door building were in the Bari area at the same time as we were, although we didn't meet.

Senecio lives!

Several years ago I wrote about my connection to this painting 'Senecio' by Paul Klee, so I'm not going to repeat it here. Instead I'll explain why my attention was drawn to the painting anew.

Last night, during a commercial break from the news, my eyes caught an advert that appeared to be set in Italy, selling t-shirts. As I don't have the kind of body that looks good these days in a t-shirt, I wasn't too interested ... until one of the actors turned his back to the camera. On the reverse side of the shirt there was a print of Senecio! It was only visible for a few seconds, and I wonder how many people noticed it.

This morning, by chance, I happened to be in our local shopping mall where is situated a branch of the clothing company that created the television advert. I entered and explained that I was looking for the t-shirt worn in the new advertisement by actor/model Ran Danker (I could identify him, but not his two cronies in the advert). The salespeople didn't know what I was talking about at first, but after a few minutes, they found the shirt that RD was wearing and its catalogue number. Another minute later and I was looking at the shirt itself, or more accurately, at its back. Indeed, Senecio lives. Naturally I bought the shirt.

I wonder whether the Klee estate gets a cut from this sale.

[Although Blogger says that it sends the contents of a blog entry automatically to a list of emails, more often than not this doesn't happen. I have a working hypothesis that having a picture in the blog entry prevents it from being sent. I'll soon see whether my hypothesis is confirmed.]

Update from two months later: I get the impression that the advert that caught my eye was broadcast once only (at least, I've never seen it again), so it was very much serendipity that allowed me to catch it.